Not just to compensate. By making energy (& water) much more expensive pro-rata - you have virtually total control over a population.Yea but once consumption drops they'll simply increase the daily standing charge to compensate I would think.
Only real solution is probably off grid...but then they can simply tax solar panels by the sqm...if historically they can tax windows I'm pretty sure they can justify taxing anything!
No ordinary person will be going very far or doing anything much outside of their work or home..... because they simply will not be able to afford to do so.
It was a proven system of control by the "Haves" over the "Have nots" for thousands of years.
I know lots think stuff like this is the ravings of a Tinfoil Hat wearing loony - but when you look at all the small pieces of the Jigsaw, all the policies and tech and the mechanisms for surveillance & control that have crept into place over the last (say) 20-years.......
Our own Govts (of whatever colour tie) are inexorably driving & herding the population into an electronic & financially managed "virtual corral" where our potential to use Resources is not "encouraged" but "forced".
The ones able to freely roam (& consume) outside the confines of these virtual fences.... will be the Wealthy & Powerful Elite, and their Governnent & Enforcement Minions.
The writing is on the wall.
"Hunger Games UK" anyone? Many will scoff - but its a variation of a dystopian future that the evidence says is far from an impossible reality - and not too distant a reality either.
Ho ho ho!